I really like Lem, but Solaris is probably my least favourite of his stories. It does have the thing I most admire in Lem's work of being about true aliens - that is, not just us again but in a Halloween costume like a Star Trek alien - but somehow Solaris doesn't "work" for me even though say, Memoirs Found In A Bathtub or Futurological Congress do.
Are you a PKD fan too? The two you mentioned are amongst Lem's most Dick-ian stories. Also note, there is a newer English language translation of Solaris. I liked it better than the one I read years ago.
I haven't read the book (yet), but Tarkovsky's movie is only a loose adaptation of the source material, which you might still enjoy.
I find it funny that i hated Lem for most of my life... because i was forced to read only his Robot stories in school.
I still despise those moralist fables.
But his other works? i love them! My favorite is The Star Diaries, despite having some robot stories in them.
I had it as optional and I read it out of my own volition and some of them still stays with me after almost thirty years. The one about writer wanted his robot to write stories, but in the end realizes that actually stories written by his robot are much better than his, want to turn the robot off but instead robot kills the writer... Makes you think about humanity, robotics, technology and what it is to be human or what is self-aware machine.
These were really light, nicely done stories but when you think about them, they introduce you to actual.problems that come with robotics and AI.
I am glad that I read those and kind of sad that I did not read more of Lem's books early in my life.
I am fascinated by the fact those stories were assigned in school. I happen to love them. I wonder if you would have disliked them as much if they were not school assignments. Many kids grow up up hating Shakespeare and Moby Dick because they were forced to read them.
I somehow got spared and was never forced to read Moby Dick.
I recently watched “In The Heart Of the Sea” which was an adaptation of a book which recounts the tragedy of the Whaleship Essex in the early 1800s, based on the written accounts of two of the surviving crew. I haven’t read the book, but the movie frames the story as an author interviewing the last remaining survivor in old age.
Having not read Moby Dick, I at first thought this was a movie version as the storyline kind of seemed similar but the events didn’t seem to match to what I knew.
Finally it clicked for me, and revealed at the end, that the interviewer was Herman Melville getting inspiration for his Moby Dick.
The movie has increased my curiosity and desire into reading Moby Didk.